NPH: 'As Hedwig, I’ll be all legs and butt and back'

By Diego James Sept. 24, 2013, 2:15 p.m.

Reactions to Neil Patrick Harris's Emmys hosting have been mixed (although we loved the chorus boy routine in the middle of the show), but luckily he's not shy talking about his upcoming role on Broadway in Hedwig and the Angry Inch, beginning March 29, 2014.Over the years, NPH has built on a masculine image that he's played for comic effect. For most of the series, his How I Met Your Mother character, Barney, was a womanizer (who loves magic, just like the actor) who obsessed over grooming and fashion details. But that's all about to be thrown out the window when he corsets himself and dons that big ol' blond Hedwig—and the transformation has already begun. The already trim actor explained to Vanity Fair that he had been slimming down for the role, since Hedwig explains in the show that she's a size 6. “As Barney, I’m all shoulders and arms and chest, but as Hedwig I’ll be all legs and butt and back,” Harris explained. “Like Cyd Charisse.”

He also explained that, "had he been a star in the 1950s and compelled by the mores of the time to enter into a sham marriage for publicity purposes, he would have taken as his bride either Doris Day or Cyd Charisse—'sort of the feminine-masculine,' he explains."